Will Tomorrow Bring Us Together?
by sashimi17
Summary: "No one would have guessed that two years ago, these three were friends without being aware of it, and that each sometimes wondered if they would make good on their last promise, to meet again." Two years after the anime ends, Fuu, Mugen, and Jin are still learning to live without each other. But fate has something else in store for them! :) Blame Mugen for the rating!
1. Chapter 1

Ohayou! Samurai Champloo is one of my favorite animes, and the ending really, _really_ bothered me. How could they all just leave each other like that?! Sadness :,( I had to make sure they would see each other again, so I'm writing this! Mugen x Fuu forever!

In a shack outside of Nagasaki, a young woman sat in dusky half-darkness, trying to calm a little boy crying for his father.

Arriving on an island in western Japan, a quiet ronin hoped he hadn't lost his chance at a life he now realized he'd wanted for a long time.

In a city whose name he couldn't even remember, a fate-tempting, death-evading former prisoner slumped at a tavern table drinking sake...just as he did most nights. He didn't know why he felt dissatisfied, but he figured it didn't matter.

No one would have guessed that only two years ago, these three were friends without being aware of it; that they had once quarreled, starved, and smuggled their way across Japan; and that each sometimes wondered if they would ever make good on their last promise, to meet again.

Chapter 1

"Fuu-san! Fuu-san? Are you in there?" came an elderly woman's voice with a friendly tap on the door. Fuu sat her son on the futon and got up.

"Ame-san! Welcome," she said to the squat, smiling older woman standing at her threshold. Ame was one of the few people Fuu was happy to see these days. "Come in and I'll make you some tea."

As Fuu poured tea, Ame scooped up the child, bouncing him in her arms. "How is little Jin?" she cooed.

Something in the woman's question made Fuu swallow hard, but she managed to reply cheerfully, "He's growing quickly! He's even started walking a bit."

At least Ame never asked after Hideki, her husband, as the other women did. These days, Fuu rarely knew if he was dead or alive…not that it mattered much to her.

After Ame had left, giving Fuu a bundle of radishes for the day's soup, Fuu swept the floor, weeded the vegetable garden, and fed Jin. Then she dug a cloth bag from a hole under the futon and weighed it in her palm. It was growing lighter by the week; she could only feel a few coins in it by now. Tomorrow she would have to find another job in town.

Fuu laid back and gazed at the ceiling. There were no windows in Hideki's shack, so the blue slits of sky in the roof were glowing. They wavered and melted as Fuu let herself cry.

She was remembering another bright blue sky, two years ago, when she'd carelessly said goodbye to the best friends she'd ever had. How stupid she'd been, to not even realize what she was doing as she waved and walked away without even looking back.

But that was life, and lately she'd learned that life wasn't meant to be happy. _I'm lucky to have known Mugen and Jin; that was the best part of my life. It had to end; what more could I have expected?_ Fuu told herself. When she heard drunken singing at the bottom of the hill, she knew that Hideki was home (for the first time in three days)...and that he'd brought friends. She sighed loudly and scrubbed away her tears, then hid Jin safely in bed.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

How had she become this? Fuu, who had once been a lively, sharp-tongued girl on the adventure of her life, was now an unhappy wife and reluctant mother, mistress of a run-down wooden hut on a lonely hill near the last stop of her journey.

Fuu often wondered this herself, with the detachment of an outsider hearing about someone else. Something had changed in her, making it take a lot of courage for her to admit that this was her life.

The day after the three had split up, Fuu awoke with a sinking, ominous feeling. It wasn't related to hunger or poverty; those were casual matters by then. She soon found herself back in Nagasaki, and got a job as a part-time worker at a ramen stand. Fuu earned just enough each day to pay for a meal and a room at an inn. For the first time in her life she had no purpose, nothing to anticipate except gradual aging and eventual death. She had found her father; he was now dead. Mugen and Jin were far away, and—at least—they had promised not to fight. There was nothing more for her to work for.

Fuu began having nightmares. Her father's blood splattered again and again across her face. Mugen washed up on a strange beach, lifeless. A sword pierced Jin straight through. Fuu would moan helplessly in her sleep, unable to save her friends, unable to wake up. In the morning, she'd lie lifelessly in her room, worrying for her old bodyguards, wondering if they were still alive, and longing with all her heart for the old days.

She never wanted to talk about her journey. It was too sacred to discuss with other people. Besides, she doubted anyone would believe her stories, and then they would joke about them. So Fuu stood silently behind the steaming bowls of ramen, trying to adjust to the fact that this would be her life from now on.

One especially bad night, Fuu's moans woke up the entire inn. The innkeeper sent his son to throw her out. "I've had enough of these haunting cries," he roared. "It's bad for business!"

Hideki knocked softly on Fuu's door and shook her awake. He was secretly pleased to be alone with her in her room. More than once he'd tried to ask her out, but she would only stare blankly at him for a minute, then shake her head and return to work.

Fuu woke to the oddly comforting words of the innkeeper's son, and decided sleepily that she did want to talk to someone, after all. Two months later, Fuu accepted his proposal of marriage, feeling that it was the only option her life held. She'd long ago abandoned childish dreams of running off to a faraway land with a tall, glasses-wearing ronin. Yet, when her first child, a boy, was born, Fuu stared numbly past Hideki and declared, "His name is Jin."

Luckily, Hideki had by then forgotten all about Fuu's adventures with the two samurai, and his wife's choice of name did not disturb him. He was far too busy with bars and brothels to even care that he had a son.


End file.
